


Finality

by annies_hoodie



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Canon Compliant, Other, annieweek
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-22
Updated: 2018-03-22
Packaged: 2019-04-06 12:51:57
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14057379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/annies_hoodie/pseuds/annies_hoodie
Summary: A piece told from Annie's point of view during the Female Titan reveal, written for Day 4 of #annieweek: Lies/Honesty.





	Finality

_I think that it's too late **  
**_

_To admit to you that I'm hurting_

_With my dying heart_

_And my memories stained red_

* * *

 

There is no way for her to escape.

In a way, it is probably for the better. The building fear and dread that constricted her small frame until this moment has now been replaced by a quiet apathy, a near surrender to her sealed fate. Now, they’d find out that she was the Female Titan. They’d find out that the comrade they’d shared meals with, shared a dorm with, learned with and worked alongside was the very thing they were training to kill. She doesn’t find the irony to be funny, and she knows they won’t either. But none of that matters now. Everything she’s been through amounts to this moment. She has lived the lie this long, played the part well. Now comes the final act.

She looks lazily down at the trio beneath her feet at the tunnel opening, her expression calm, careful not to betray her pounding heart, her souring stomach. She thinks about how it is time to throw whatever humanity she’s worked to preserve away, to throw the hopes and far-fetched dreams of being absolved of her mission away. The day is here, and even if her heart is not in it she has to convince her mind. She sets her jaw before looking at Armin because she knows a part of her may falter when she inevitably meets his eyes, and steels herself to will it away. She has known, for a long time, that she would never have the chance to be close with him, Eren and even Mikasa like she might have wanted to, an idea she barely let herself entertain before smashing it to smithereens back then. She did not get to have friends, not if she knew she’d have to betray them like this.

She thinks of the grassy expanse over the wall that stands between her and home, letting the lukewarm midday breeze pass by her.

She waits a moment before finally meeting Armin’s eyes, hoping someone would pick her up and take her back to her dorm room, for some message in the sky above to tell her that the mission is off. She wants someone to save her. But no one does. No one can.

Armin’s eyes are wide, his hand shaking as he clutches his flare gun. Annie thinks it looks like he’s staring at the Grim Reaper, the way his face is white as a sheet, sweat sticking to his skin.

“I’m hurt,” Annie says. “When did you start looking at me that way...Armin?”

She’s created an opening. She will let him tell the tale of her betrayal because she doesn’t think she can bring herself to. She only has enough willpower to complete her mission, knowing that if she’d have to confess to her atrocities she’d surely break down. She’d give in. But such a thing cannot happen, so she looks away as Armin begins the tale of her treachery.

“Annie, why?” Armin’s voice is soft. Desperate. “Why did you have Marco’s maneuver gear?”

She hears Eren inhale sharply in disbelief, and her heart seizes as she clenches her teeth.

_I’m sorry, Eren._  

Perhaps out of all of them, it was him she hated to disappoint the most.

“I remember even it’s tiniest marks and dings...because we’d repair them together. That’s why I recognized them.”

All Annie can hear is Marco screaming her name as he is torn apart by Titans. She stares directly at the wall in front of her as she remembers how bad her hands were shaking as she stripped him of his gear. She swallows thickly. “I see. Well, I happened to find it.”

She had never wanted to do it. It was Reiner’s mistake, not hers. Yet she was the one to pay for it. And Marco was dead.

Armin continues when she doesn’t speak any further. “Then you killed the two Titans we captured?”

_Along with Reiner, everyone’s supposed big brother._

She wished it was Reiner standing in her position right now, and not her. Anyone but her.

She wastes no time in replying. “Who knows....but if you thought that a month ago, why didn’t you act then?”

Armin is frantic. “Because I still can’t believe it! I wanted to think that my eyes had deceived me. And because of that…”

He doesn’t have to explain further. It was because of his good will, because he had given her the benefit of doubt, that she was standing here before them today. Annie knows he didn’t want it be true then, and he didn’t want it to be true now. If only he knew she felt the same way.

Armin continues. “But...what about you?”

Annie is still, waiting for him to continue.

“You didn’t kill me back then. And that’s why this is happening now.”

A gentle wave of wind interrupts their conversation, sending tiny leaves to sweep by Annie’s boots. She is barely breathing,

Annie speaks softly. “Yeah, I think so too. I never expected you to push me this far.”

“Why didn’t I kill you then?”

She says it more to herself than Armin. Maybe, if she’d killed him then, it’d be easier now. But she knows that’s not the truth. She could cut down every being standing in her way and it still wouldn’t change anything, wouldn’t stop her from waking up in a cold sweat, a violent scream threatening to escape from her lips every night, couldn’t save her from doing the only thing she’d been born into this world to do. No, killing Armin wouldn’t have done anything except make her hate herself more than she already does.

Secretly, desperately, up until this point she had tried to cling on to the remaining shreds of her morality, even amidst the carnage she’d caused. Yet she realizes, amidst a feeling of melancholy settling over her, that it will be the cause of her downfall. She had spared a life while unknowingly giving up hers. With a heavy sadness filling her soul, she decides she finds it morbidly poetic.

Eren’s loud, distraught voice pulls her out of her thoughts. “Hey, Annie! There’s still a chance you’re an idiot who’s just going along with this because you have a shitty sense of humor. So get down here now!”

_I can’t, Eren._

She remembers having him in a hold on the scratchy, hard training grounds, the fire having long distinguished from his vivid green eyes. He had said he wanted to give up, and she had told him no. She didn’t need him to give up, she needed him to learn how to use his own strength. She had never been a nurturing person, but she remembers feeling some intrinsic need to help Eren, to pass on what she knew. She wouldn’t even consider showing her moves to any of the other trainees, but with Eren, she wanted to. She hadn’t known then that they’d find their roles reversed now, Annie vulnerable and cornered while Eren and his friends held the figurative higher ground. Even if she had, she knows she wouldn’t change a thing.

Annie wonders what her father would think about her teaching the boy she was supposed to capture how to fight just like her. He’d probably call her a fool, tell her it was suicide to give up her secrets to be used against her like that. But regarding her relationship with Eren, and what she had taught him, Annie is sure she has no regrets.

Eren takes a few steps forward and calls to her earnestly.

“You can prove something just by going underground. Get down here and prove it!”

She still does not meet his eyes. “I can’t. I have failed to become a warrior.”

And she has. In every respect, she has failed.

But it was never about being a warrior for her. For Annie, it is about returning to Marley. It is about fulfilling the only promise she’s ever made in her life to the only person that is on her side, going back to the only place she’s been able to call home. She has to go home, she has to. It is all she’s ever known.

And to do that, she needs to kill Annie and become the Female Titan.

Eren is screaming now, losing all sensibility. “I said this isn’t funny!”

Armin joins in, trying his best to persuade her. “Let’s talk, Annie! We can still talk--”

He’s cut off abruptly by the sound of a hood being wrenched off, of boots taking a strong stand.

Mikasa.

Of course.

Her voice is low, and threatening. “That’s enough.”

Annie’s mind has gone blank, and her surroundings have muted. She feels encased, trapped, and powerless as she lets the Female Titan take over her body, because she can’t be Annie anymore. Not if she wants to go home.

“I can’t listen to anymore of this. It’s pointless.”

Annie’s last conscious thought as she descends into a deep darkness is that she agrees with Mikasa. She always has.

“I’ll tear you apart again, Female Titan!”

_You will try._

She shuts her eyes, her pulse hammering deep inside her skull, blood pumping vigorously. When she finally opens her eyes, her vision is almost blurry, stained with red as she gives in to the adrenaline, gives in to her Titan form. She feels unbelievably tall, swaying languidly.

She lets out a laugh, a peculiar, shrill sound as she prepares to transform.

“Armin, I’m glad I could be a good person to you. You’ve won your bet.”

She alreadys tastes blood in her mouth, already longs to be in the warm, pulsing cocoon of her titan body. Freedom is near.

Armin’s eyes are round with terror. Annie is gone.

The Female Titan bares her teeth, taunting those that stand in her way below. “But...this is where my bet begins!”

* * *

 

_I think that it's too late_

_To admit to you that I'm hurting_

_My heart is not like it was before_

_Because it softly falls asleep_

**Author's Note:**

> The lyrics in the beginning and end are from the Cœur de pirate song "La petite Mort", thought I did change the line "memories stained white" to "memories stained red".


End file.
